Special Envoy for Post-Holocaust Issues

Debate between Baroness Deech and Baroness Winterton of Doncaster

Tuesday 20th October 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Winterton of Doncaster (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord for that question and for the work that he did as special envoy. I wonder if it might be helpful if he came along to the briefing as well, because it is important to show the continuity between the work that he did and the work that Jon Pearce is doing as the current special envoy. The noble Lord makes an important point. I emphasise again that the special envoy recently agreed a co-ordinated approach to Holocaust-era restitution in Poland with his US counterpart. He also raised the issue directly with the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Warsaw. With international partners—it is important that that is how we do this—we continue to press Poland to confront this historic injustice and deliver a fair, comprehensive and final settlement of outstanding restitution claims.

[Baroness Deech (CB)]

My Lords, Poland has been an outlier in this for many decades. One feels that it is waiting for everyone to die so it can avoid making restitution. I encourage the Minister to take this issue to the Council of Europe, which is the best forum for this. It should be proposed to Poland that it allow litigation outside Poland, provide access to relevant records, establish a central fund as other countries have done to pay at least partial compensation and preserve the memory of the dispossessed by placing Stolpersteine outside their former homes. It has so far refused to do this, in an attempt to obliterate the memory, as I have seen there for myself.

[Baroness Winterton of Doncaster (Lab)]

I thank the noble Baroness for her question and her long-standing campaigning on this issue. I know how deeply she feels about it. The special envoy has already been looking at some of the issues she has raised, but I will have further discussions with him about her point on the Council of Europe. Obviously, there are parliamentary delegations to that, so she may wish to raise it with representatives from this House who are on the Council of Europe too.